China’s Own "Nth Room"? Telegram Chats Sharing Intimate Photos And Videos Of Women Uncovered
Almost a million women in China have been secretly filmed without their consent and had their photos and videos shared into Telegram rooms with hundreds of thousands of men.
Is this China’s own “Nth Room” case?
Almost a million women in China have been secretly filmed without their consent and had their photos and videos shared into Telegram rooms with hundreds of thousands of men.
In recent days, people on Chinese social media exposed a network of encrypted Telegram channels and groups called the “MaskPark Treehole Forum” consisting of more than 100,000 members, who are mostly men.
In the groups, men shared photos and videos of women they filmed without consent in everyday life — from metros, fitting rooms to hospitals — often with degrading language.
Some members even shared sexually explicit images and deepfake videos of their girlfriends and women family members, including underaged girls.
Some videos were reportedly filmed using “pinhole cameras”, which can be hidden in everyday items such as plug sockets and scented candles.
The pinhole cameras were also being sold in the MaskPark Telegram, which had a full-scale underground operation dedicated to filming, distribution and profit.
An estimated 900,000 women have been affected, according to Hong Kong outlet HK01.
The scandal, which was later picked up by local media, sparked widespread outrage in China, with relevant hashtags gaining more than 270 million views on Chinese social media, Weibo, according to Reuters.
However, related content was soon censored and taken down and later blocked entirely.
Even though the main MaskPark forums have since been taken down, many smaller sub-groups are still active, as well as related groups selling pinhole cameras.
People have compared the MaskPark scandal to the infamous Nth room incident in South Korea from 2018 to 2020.
This was a series of pay-per-view chat rooms on Telegram, where women and underaged girls were forced into taking sexual exploitation videos of themselves.
Images and videos were sold to more than 260,000 accounts, with the sex ring charging fees up to US$1,200 in cryptocurrency.
The two leaders of the Nth room were both sentenced in 2020 to 42 and 34 years in prison for blackmail, running a sexual exploitation ring and cybersex trafficking.
In China, taking photos of others without their consent is punishable by up to 10 days’ in prison and a 500 yuan (US$69) fine, while distributing pornographic materials carries a maximum sentence of 2 years in prison.
Experts have said that since Telegram is encrypted and hosted outside of China, it is difficult for Chinese police to punish people over MaskPark.
So far, Chinese authorities have not released an official statement or acted on the case.
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